


Things Never Seen, Words Never Spoken

by a_novel_idea



Category: Chronicles of Riddick (2004), Pitch Black (2000), Riddick (2013), The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury
Genre: 50 prompts, M/M, Necromongers, Pack Dynamics, Pre-Relationship, relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-24
Updated: 2014-02-04
Packaged: 2017-11-08 10:29:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/442219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_novel_idea/pseuds/a_novel_idea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fifty short snapshots of those moments never captured on-screen.</p><p>(Chapter Two contains the same prompts, though they have been rewritten. Chapter One will remain the original work.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is one of my oldest pieces. You can deffinitly tell my writting has come a long way. If the prompts seem odd to you, it's because they were randomly selected from an anatomy textbook from when I was still in highschool.

1.Absorb

It took Vaako a while to notice, but it seemed that the longer he stayed by the Lord Marshall's side, by Riddick's side, the more of the man's warmth he seemed to absorb.

2.Wind

Despite the fact that he loathed the wind Elemental, Vaako was grateful that there was someone to help his master solve the puzzle of his heritage.

3.Time

Time ran differently for Riddick and his First Amongst Commanders; at least, the Lord Marshall thought that time moved too quickly for his liking.

4.Heart Rate

After his conversion to Necroism at a young age, Vaako couldn't remember what it was like to have a heartbeat, but when he was with Riddick, Vaako didn't think he would ever forget.

5.Results

Vaako never thought the result of his late, ex-wife leaving him would be an infinitely more comfortable place in the arms of one Richard B. Riddick.

6.Susceptible

As a Necromonger, Riddick never would have thought that Vaako would be susceptible to a very pregnant HellHound.

7.Floor

Vaako never thought he would enjoy a place on the floor, seated at the feet of the leader of the most feared population in the universe.

8.Combination

Vaako was soon to find out that a combination of a good meal, a comfortable sleep, and a day off made Riddick a very happy boy.

9.Penetrate

Vaako shuddered in his lover's as Riddick's Furyan beast penetrated his mind, wiping the cobwebs from his own primal side.

10.Addition

The addition of six HellHound puppies to their chambers almost made Vaako happy he would never have children of his own. Almost.

11.System

Vaako and Riddick were quick to work out a system, in the beginning; Riddick was free to announce his ownership of the First Amongst Commanders as long as he refrained from leaving those embarrassing bite marks on Vaako's neck.

12.Complete

Vaako discovered that, on his very occasional mission where he was away from his lover for a long period of time, he didn't feel quite so complete.

13.Below

Disregarding titles, Riddick never thought of Vaako as below him in any way.

14.Lessen

The Lord Marshall found that the grip on his heart didn't lessen until hazel-green eyes finally opened to meet his silvery-grey ones after six days of coma-induced sleep.

15.Vital

Riddick never thought of Vaako as anything less than vital.

16.Body

Vaako's body was beautiful, there was no doubting that, but Riddick considered the soul beneath the skin to be more so.

17.Beta

If Riddick was Alpha among the Necro population, then there was no doubt in anyone's mind that Vaako was the Beta.

18.Bone

After months of being held captive, Riddick was heartbroken to find that he could feel his lover's bones through his skin.

19.Guide

When Riddick had to cross the Threshold, like every Lord Marshall before him had to do, he considered finding Vaako again his only guide home.

20.Remains

No one complained when the remains of former Dame Vaako were found mutilated on the throne room floor; the cleaning crew only offered their Lord Marshall his blade back.

21.Attached

Vaako was almost horror-stricken when he discovered that one of the female pups, Astrid, Riddick had named her, had become attached to him and refused to do anything but follow him through Necropolis.

22.Practice

Vaako found that only through practice could he keep from laughing ever y time he found Riddick piled under a mountain of HellHounds and pups.

23.Limitations

Riddick hated admitting to limitations; he hated even more when Vaako had to give in because of them.

24.Fade

Riddick discovered that the more nights he spent wrapped around his lover, the less that annoying Furyan goddess plagued him in his sleep.

25.Educational

The more the two were around each other, the more, educational, their time became.

26.Advantage

Riddick knew that the only advantage he held over Vaako anymore, was that the other man still got distracted by his eyes sometimes.

27.Resources

Vaako found their resources suspiciously low after a month-long cryosleep and couldn't help but notice the guilty way the Hounds slunk around.

28.Delayed

Vaako hated, absolutely loathed, being delayed home.

29.Might

Where Lord Marshall Zhylaw had been for might and brute strength, Riddick was all about stealth.

30.Institution

Riddick was Lord Marshall for a year before he knew about the mental institution for the conversion rejects in the bowels of the ship.

31.Property

No one refuted his ownership once rumors spread of the bite-mark shaped scars Riddick had pressed into Vaako's skin.

32.Tool

At the worst of times, the lowest of his lows, Vaako only felt like a means to an end for his Lord Marshall.

33.Changes

Vaako thought it figured that the first of the changes Riddick made was to stop the forced conversion of the population of Helion Prime.

34.Payments

Vaako took what was due from the solider that was careless enough to kick Astrid and not beg his forgiveness.

35.Coins

Riddick found that the only thing Vaako had from his life before conversion was a dull gold coin that hung on a chain around his neck.

36.Health

Riddick never knew that the, even half dead, that his lover would be vulnerable to the common flu.

37.Decline

Vaako never declined an offer from his Lord Marshall. Never.

38.Future

As far as Riddick was concerned, his future belonged to one Necromonger, not the race as a whole.

39.Pressure

Riddick found the pressure delicious when his lover gripped him like that.

40.Continuous

The shock was continuous; first Kyra's death, killing the former Lord Marshall and taking his throne, then, finally, the medical report that confirmed that, yes, Vaako, First Amongst Commanders, was indeed Furyan.

41.Impulse

His first impulse, after this news, was to take what was his.

42.Between

Between his newly discovered bloodline and the turmoil that accompanied the changing of rule, Vaako almost couldn't handle a new lover on top of it all.

43.Risk

There was always a risk with Riddick, but Vaako really wouldn't have him any other way.

44.Example

Examples were made of the conspiring nobles until Riddick had weeded out all of the unfaithful.

45.Response

The population's response to Riddick's decision to take Vaako as a mate was to shrug and thing 'about time'.

46.Branches

The best thing about finally remembering his origins was that he could trace his family tree back to the very beginning of their home planet.

47.Receive

The greatest honor was to receive the Lord Marshall's trust.

48.Target

Prey, target, mark, Riddick couldn't manage to call Vaako any of these things even as he stalked the man from the shadows.

49.Resist

Riddick never thought to resist these urges to claim.

50.Passive

Riddick had never been so mad, angry, upset, furious, to return to their chambers and find his mate, his mate, passive, even if it was because of a cold.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter features the same prompts, though they have been rewritten.

**1\. Absorb**

It takes him twenty-seven cycles to notice the warmth, the blood searing heat that has come to invade his veins. It’s a burn he longs for, craves, needs more than the sustenance in his belly or air in his chest. It takes two cycles more to figure out that it is him, the Lord Marshall, _Riddick_ , that has infected him, has driven him to desperate measures to continue this habit, this addiction that leaves him weak and wanting and empty without it. It is Riddick’s warmth that he has come to absorb. The heat of his skin, of his eyes, the fire that burns at the bottom of his soul, all-consuming and infinitely alive.

**2\. Wind**

It takes the control he has taken years to master to keep from wrapping his fingers around the woman’s neck, to keep from wrestling the life from her very soul, to deprive her of the wind that makes breezes through her very being. He loathes her, but at the same time, he does not have the answers she continues to keep from them, from Riddick. She has questions to their answers, predictions of a future so heavily shrouded that even Riddick’s eyes cannot cut away the darkness. That is the reason she lives, and if she can give his lord and master the answers required to continue his journey, to lead them to whatever peace there is, then he can be nothing but grateful that she has not disappeared.

**3\. Time**

It takes cycle upon cycle upon century to realize that time has moved differently for Riddick and his First Amongst Commanders. They have stayed the same through centuries and generations, and they have grown to be gods among the Necromongers for it. They have not aged, their skills have not dulled, they are not privy to sickness or death. They have overcome the definition of mortal. It is the time spent side-by-side that the Lord Marshall wishes could be stopped altogether. 

**4\. Heart Rate**

He is eight years old when the Necromongers conquer his home planet, his safe haven. He remembers the green of the fields, the feel of true paper books between his fingers, the smell of things other than blood and metal and sweat. He remembers his mother, soft and strong and what he had thought to look for in a mate, his brothers, swift on their feet and so wild they could never seem to be tamed by typical things. He remembers the day he lost all of it, the grass beneath his feet, the books in his hands, his brothers by his side, his mother watching over them. He has forgotten what it is like to feel his heart beat. It is a startling revelation to realize that Riddick’s works so much better than his own, and he feels like he could never forget again.

**5\. Results**

The divorce does not blind side him as much as the rumors whisper. In fact, he had been hoping that he would not have to be the one to instigate it for some time. He does the respectful thing: he sheds his marriage band and he replaces it with the traditional band of black to signify the mourning or losing a spouse. His wife does not pay him the same respect. She sheds her marriage band, and forgoes the mourning period, instead taking bed with another Commander, new and fresh in his promotion. He can see the way her mind curves around the plot to make this new soldier, this new victim, into a candidate for the next Challenger. He wishes the other man luck, though does not specify on the good or bad. 

As a result of the amicably broken bond, he becomes quite fond of his place by Riddick’s side.

**6\. Susceptible**

Vaako is invulnerable to many things, sickness and death chief amongst them. As such, when the Lord Marshall proposes a rescue mission to attend some of his ‘comrades’ left behind on the prison planet designated Crematoria, the First Among does not foresee the exact opposite being true when faced with an obviously pregnant Hellhound. She wheedles into his life, into his schedule, into the foundation of his life, and he cannot respond when Riddick decides that his circumstances are amusing. 

**7\. Floor**

It is a seat most coveted by the women and concubines of the Necromongers, the floor of the dais on which the Lord Marshall’s throne sits. It has been the resting place of queens, slaves, concubines, and now the First Amongst Commanders. It is a peaceful place, to sit where so few have before, above everyone but the Lord Marshall, below Riddick as none of the previous Lord Marshalls have mattered, below the only being in the universes that Vaako will ever kneel before again. 

**8\. Combination**

It is a volatile mix of poisons and exhaustion that lay waste to Vaako. He does not remember much, fleeting images of Riddick, fighting and war-torn and not necessarily made of reality, injured and ripped to pieces by beings that have haunted Vaako’s nightmares for decades, grotesque and spindly, spined and sharpened, devoured by the world ender described in a book so very long ago. He remembers whispered words of comfort in his ear, heavy with promise and sorrow. He remembers warmth along his side, too hot to even be his Lord Marshall. He remembers waking, alarmed and rigid, and being told that all is well by the only person he would trust those words to come from. 

**9\. Penetrate**

Riddick growls, tight and wanting, as his teeth dig into his First Amongst’s neck. Life blood rushes forth, crowding his senses and caressing his tongue so sweetly. It is a mate mark, the place where his teeth have found a home, and he does not want more damage to be left than necessary, but Vaako will not let him go, will not let him pull away from the most beautiful thing that has ever happened to him. The blood runs slick over Vaako’s collar, down his chest, and Riddick chases his down the pale body beneath him until he can’t anymore, not without unseating the other man from their joining.

**10\. Addition**

They number six when the previously pregnant Hellhound allows them to attend to her and her pups. They squirm and wriggle, plainly seeking the warmth that their mother’s belly can no longer provide. They are small, and so so precious, new life where it has never been allowed. Riddick is as a father would be, even if he is not directly responsible for the births. It makes Vaako wonder, just a whisper in the back of his mind that he hasn’t heard in a long time, what it would be like to have children of his own. It is an idea quickly snuffed for the impossibility of it.

**11\. System**

The system between them becomes defunct as soon as Wulia gives voice to the long coming divorce. Neither of them must sneak any longer down darkened hallways and through passages long forgotten by any other than dead locked maintenance crews. Riddick is free to lay claim to Vaako the moment the breaking of the marriage bond is publicly recognized. The Lord Marshall takes his advantage in marking Vaako where his high collars will not cover, under his chin, on his jaw, in the very fabric of the man’s soul.

**12\. Complete**

It’s the third set of cycles apart from his lover when Vaako begins to lose his mind. His clothing is too rough on his skin, too stiff, and his mind is too quiet, too full of nothing but his own thoughts and wants and dreams. His crew notices, how couldn’t they, but as they are his men, loyal to him and only the Lord Marshall besides, they offer him solutions, answers that aren’t, and while the bottle he’s been handed takes the edge off of his insanity, it does nothing to fill the void. 

**13\. Below**

He is the Lord Marshall, and there are none equal nor above him: that’s what the priests tell him, try to impress on him, try to work into his way of thinking. It infuriates him that these men, these killers of Furyans, could try and decide Vaako’s place among them. He is not kind when he informs them that the only time Vaako is below him is when he’s on his knees. They give no argument. 

**14\. Lessen**

The grip on his heart, and what a new and frivolous organ that is, never lessens, not through the damage, and the danger, and the sleep, sleep, sleep. It jolts when there’s movement, and squeezes when there isn’t. Long after their trials are over, and hazel-green eyes are blinking up at him again, out of darkness, out of danger, out of his mind, he decides that maybe this is what fear feels like, and he hasn’t felt fear in a long, long time. What a curious creature that could bring it back.

**15\. Vital**

It’s an instinct, that’s what he makes himself believe. It’s nothing but his Furyan nature shining through in the presence of a worthy mate. He has no reason to want to hide this man from the world, the universe, to hold and shield and protect like he’s something so precious, like he’s more vital than the air in his lungs, and the blood in his veins. 

**16\. Body**

They have always known that bodies are temporary things, so fragile, and destructible, and useless by themselves. They bruise and break and stay damaged when they cannot recover. They are nothing. But then, bodies keep them grounded, pull them together, keep them whole, because who can say what a soul would do without one. 

**17\. Beta**

Riddick has never denied his alpha nature, never suppressed it. It has kept him alive, kept him fighting. He is it as much as it is him. He has never had more pleasure than convincing his First Amongst Commander’s that he is anything but beta to his alpha.

**18\. Bone**

When they locate him, months and months and eons away from where they started, Vaako is hardly more than skin and bone, wasted away as a reminder that they could have found him sooner, but they didn’t. He’s weaker than he’s ever been, and Vaako knows that if he were to be left to his own devices, he’d be dead. There isn’t a way around that. Riddick is careful with him, gentle and restrained, but he aches for nothing more than the harsh push and pull of their skin threaded together, the biting sting of Riddick’s teeth in his flesh. He longs for nothing more than normal.

**19\. Guide**

There is no guide, no manual, no instruction sheet that comes with usurping the Lord Marshall’s position. It’s like a free fall from one life into another, an uncontrolled spiral downward. He keeps waiting to hit bottom. He hasn’t. Yet. It’s the inevitable ‘yet’ that makes the inner most part of him cringe. The ‘what next?’. The ‘when?’. He doesn’t remember when he started caring.

**20\. Remains**

It comes as no surprise when the former Dame Vaako’s blood is found splashed on the walls. Her body has been torn to pieces, thirty-six to be exact, and the menial cleaning crew finds great joy in being very, very exact. When the sleek silver blade is found among the tattered flesh, the menial merely offers it back the Lord Marshall. 

**21\. Attached**

It horrifies him when he first finds that the smallest pup, the female Astrid, has taken a liking to him. Imprinting, Riddick calls it. She’s chosen him as a substitute as her mother. She follows him, refuses to leave his side, and the longer she stays with him, the less he can find a reason for her to go. She stays by his heel, always there but never underfoot. 

**22\. Practice**

It takes practice to keep up with the Lord Marshall, practice to keep himself from falling behind and being left there. He has to touch the animal side that he’s ignored all his life, kept at bay with the rigidness of the regime. It becomes his safe place, his haven from everything that means him harm or ill will. It is the place he shares with Riddick, and only Riddick.

**23\. Limitations**

He’s always had limits, always had a breaking point. He’s tried pushing past it, ignoring the heaviness of his lungs, the ache in his spine, but it hardly ever proves to his advantage; more often than not, he is left with a soul-deep burning that makes him long for the purification chambers to wash it away. He doesn’t even have that simple peace anymore. He pushes when he can, and he fails when he can’t push anymore, and he has to watch his Lord Marshall keep going.

**24\. Fade**

He doesn’t realize he hasn’t seen her in his dreams until she comes back, bright and shining and heady like the scent of lust. She doesn’t seem as angry, as hurt, as betrayed as she had when she first came to him, telling him of his ancestors and their downfall. He wonders what’s changed, but he doesn’t ask. He forgets that she can tell anyway. It’s him, she says, he’s changed. He’s started moving in the right direction, down the path to restoring their people, and if a single face appears in his mind when she says he’s done something right, well, that’s just between them.

**25\. Educational**

Vaako has always treated his time among the purifiers and other nobles as an educational experience. They develop new habits, form and destroy alliances, sing praises in one ear while hissing criticism in another. It is when he and the Lord Marshall enter the room and command their attention that they finally stop whispering, and that, he supposed, is the most educational of all.

**26\. Advantage**

As First Amongst Commanders, and the only consort in the Lord Marshall’s bed, Vaako has never been able to afford to give up an advantage. He is a prime example of what a Necromonger should strive to be: intelligent, strong, willful, courageous in battle. He has lead legions and conquered planets, toppled civilizations, and ended ways of life in fashions that would leave no memory left of them in the universe. He has always strived to be what he should for his Religion. 

**27\. Resources**

There are eighteen complaints waiting for them when they awaken from a month-long cryosleep, each more extensive and crudely worded than the one previous. The last one in the stack is simply a list of supplies that have been reported missing, or ultimately diminished. He mimes his way through protocol, reads all of the reports, checks and rechecks the security feeds, and tries to ignore the guilty way the Hounds slink around their chambers while Riddick laughs.

**28\. Delayed**

He cannot, at this time, think of something has annoys him more than being delayed. He has been away from the Basillica for twelve cycles, when the simple expedition should have taken no more than five. It is not the fault of the crew at his command, nor is it his, but as the days grow longer, and their journey more wearisome, he cannot help but to long for the vaulted ceilings of his mothership and the warm arms of his lover.

**29\. Might**

The first few weeks of Lord Marshall Riddick’s reign revealed the true differences between him and the previous Lord Marshall, Zhylaw. The promoted Necromonger has been about strength, power, and wearing his rank for all to see. He commanded the halls of the Basillica like the king he thought himself to be. Riddick, on the opposite side of the scale, had no need to showcase his power, strength, or rank; he was much more effective at proving it upon his Challengers.

**30\. Institution**

The Reaver, the Horde’s lowest ranking ship, is a subject none of the Elite discuss or acknowledge. It houses the dregs of their society, worthless of their attention, and embarrassments to their existence. Vaako takes it upon himself to explain the presence of such a ship to the Riddick. It’s one of their least friendly conversations. He is relieved when the Lord Marshall does not insist upon a visit to the Institution.

**31\. Property**

There has never been a question of ownership among the Elite, or the Purifiers, or the other Commanders, or the soldiers. They know that to touch, to try and take, to attempt to make what can never belong to them theirs, is to willingly give up their on life before their due time. For those who are not aware of what they can and cannot touch, take, own, the ring of never healing bite barks along the First Amongst Commanders’ neck is a good indication. 

**32\. Tools**

There are times he won’t admit to, periods of dark depression, deep and cloying and consuming, where he feels like nothing more than a tool for the Necromonger race, the Religion, the Riddick. The voice in the back of his head whispers of his worthlessness, and sounds suspiciously like his ex-Dame. He works himself to exhaustion to quiet the voice; if he is too tired to think, it is too tired to talk. On the nights that have turned into early mornings that have turned into even later nights, he is always surprised when his Lord Marshall coaxes him back to their chambers.

**33\. Changes**

He is unsurprised when one of the Riddick’s first commands is to cease the mandatory Purification of the population of Hellion Prime. He does not know the breeder, his habits, his thoughts, not yet, but what he does know is that the Furyan sought Irgun, the previous First Among Commanders, and slaughtered him in front of the Horde just for the sake of one other man’s life. He does not value life as a whole, Vaako decides, but maybe there is room to adjust each individual’s worth.

**34\. Payments**

Though he won’t admit to growing fond of the creature, the Hellhound Astrid has proven herself worthy in battle, both on the field and in the halls of the Basillica, and as such Vaako decided at some point that she was worth protecting; it is only right to pay her the same tribute she has paid him. He takes no remorse in gutting the Sub-Commander who carelessly kicks at the Hound and thinks he can get away with it. 

**35\. Coins**

As they often spend the night in the same bed, Vaako waits for the subject to arise. He is not ashamed of his token, but he is also aware that blatant attachment to the world he was ripped from has always been seen as shunning the Religion, the Necro way of life, and ultimately leads to death before due time. The dull, battered coin that hangs around his neck becomes a plaything for the Lord Marshall, tugged at but never broken, tightened but never strained. He is relieved.

**36\. Health**

Though impervious to death and disease after their jointed trip through the Threshold, Riddick has discovered that his First Among Commanders and Consort is not immune to poison. It isn’t a pleasant discovery, full of physical sickness as the substance is rejected, and nauseating fever. The infirmary is charged with the Necromonger’s care as Riddick and those he trusts hunt through the halls of the mothership. 

**37\. Decline**

No one has declined a Lord Marshall anything he could ever want for, not the destruction of planets, or a companion for his bed, or a soul willing to lay down their lives merely so the Half-Holy Dead could feel the pleasure of taking a life without the dangers of the battlefield. Some requests have been ridiculous, others understated, some crass, and some rather rational. For all that the might of the Necromonger Horde now kneels before a breeder, one who does not know or care to know of their way of life, Vaako has never thought to deny the Riddick anything.

**38\. Future**

It’s been a relatively quiet week among the fleet, drills and paperwork, lazing and catching up on much needed sleep. Riddick and Vaako have closed themselves into their chambers with the Hounds, content to spend a day without the company of anyone else. Vaako is stretched out on their bed, clothed only by the sheets around him. Astrid lays along his side, snuffling and pressing her hot skin closer to his. Riddick watches from the doorway, relaxed and pleased with the occupant of his bed. The rest of the ghost race could boil in the heat of the closets sun for all he cared; this is what he stays for.

**39\. Pressure**

Sometimes, when they occupy the same ship, but have yet to see each other is several cycles, Vaako feels the presence of his Lord Marshall in the back of his head, at the base of his skull, in the bite marks and bruises. It’s a pressure he doesn’t necessarily need, but craves all the more the longer the time between their meetings.

**40\. Continuous**

Riddick considers his life one continuous joke: his birth, his childhood, his time in the military, running from the Mercs, the crash landing on Hades, the five years spent on the edge of the solar system, the destruction of Helion Prime, Crematoria, Kyra, the Necromongers, _you keep what you kill_. When the dust finally settles, and he feels like he can breathe again, he thinks the universe wanted one more laugh when the healers tell him there is no mistaking Vaako’s Furyan nature.

**41\. Impulse**

There are some impulses that, despite training and discipline, Riddick has never been able to deny himself. Food, sex, sleep. He’s a long way from where he started when a new impulse makes itself known, tingling under his skin and driving him mad because he doesn’t know how to sate the urge. It keeps him from sleeping, from enjoying a fight, from eating his fill. It takes two weeks to snap, fourteen days of terrorizing the Necropolis before something inside him breaks and he corner Vaako in the throne room, backs him into the wall and marks him until he bleeds, until there is no doubt in either of their minds of who the First Among belongs to.

**42\. Between**

Between the falling of one Lord Marshall and the rising of another, the private announcement of his Furyan bloodline, and the shift of power through the masses from the Elite to the soldiers, Vaako is almost hesitant to take on a new lover. His Dame is still trying to whisper espionage in his ear, and crowding their chambers with those who have remained loyal to her; he hasn’t spent a night there in several cycles. This new…proposition he’s been presented with comes with it’s obvious perks, quiet chambers and intelligent company among them, but he supposes the tipping point is the way Riddick’s mouth curls up when he says yes.

**43\. Risk**

Risk is something he is used to as an officer in the Necromonger fleet. There’s the risk of the battle field, the risk of a Challenge for is rank, the risk of finally finding the opponent who is just a step quicker, stronger, luckier. There is risk in marrying his Dame, though for all he tries, he can’t remember the reason he though she was worth it. There is risk in coming to the Lord Marshall’s attention, though the level and worthiness of the risk varies with the man himself. Zhylaw was risky only because he was mad; the man was a poor fighter, relying too little on himself and too much on what he thought the Threshold had bestowed on him. Riddick is another beast altogether. He isn’t necessarily a better fighter than Vaako, but he’s stronger, and more importantly unpredictable. Just as the Necro thought the man was going left, Riddick would turn and head in the opposite direction. He is much more dangerous than Zhylaw ever had the potential to be, and Vaako decides he wouldn’t have the breeder any other way.

**44\. Example**

Riddick calls them Examples. He hangs them in the Basillica until the flesh rots from their bones and the rope and chains won’t hold onto what’s left of them. They are a constant reminder that the Lord Marshall is not to be messed with. They consist of nobles and soldiers alike, those who conspired and those who ambushed; those who sought to Challenge the man to his face also died, though their remains were treated with the same respect as any loosing fighter. 

**45\. Response**

After the death of his ex-Dame, Vaako takes great pleasure in ridding himself of her things and moving out of the large, empty chambers he could, by right, keep. Even occupied by both them and the guests the Dame insisted on having, the rooms have always been empty; he supposes it is a result of neither of them caring to make the place more familiar. The Lord Marshall is more than welcoming when he inhabits the same bed, and if any of the few menials dedicated to Riddick have something to say about it, well, mostly they just roll their eyes and mutter and think ‘it’s about time’.

**46\. Branches**

There are several branches of the Necromonger race and Religion. Over the last few centuries there have been divides between factions and settlements set up on the occasional planet that the Horde doesn’t see as worth decimating. After so many years hardly any of them recognize each other as the same society, though each group and colony claim to recognize the Lord Marshall. Vaako isn’t sure how do deal with the diplomats that arrive from various corners of passed galaxies, but he isn’t sure that Riddick does either.

**47\. Receive**

Vaako isn’t sure what to do with it now that he’s received it, the trust of the Lord Marshall, of the Riddick. He could continue with the plot his ex-Dame had set in front of him before her death, but he honestly had no will or want to throw his life away when he is just settling back into a pleasant routine. He could try and use it to his advantage, try and sway the breeder on certain matters, but he is confident that that would get him killed just as quickly. It isn’t until he’s watching the other man across the war room, deep in discussion with another commander about the benefits of taking the newest galaxy in a specific order, planet by planet, that he decides what to do. He’ll keep the trust to himself, coddle it and keep it safe for just long enough to lure the breeder in and make him his.

**48\. Target**

Riddick spends the first several weeks of his reign stalking the shadows and the long-forgotten corridors of the Basillica, the monstrous ship he’s supposed to call home now. There are several pieces of gods awful ugly art that are merely faux fronts for tunnels that lead between private and secluded rooms; they haven’t looked to be used in years, maybe decades. He gathers what information he comes across, but doesn’t actively seek it out. His favorite thing to do, however, is follow the First Amongst Commanders around. The man keeps interesting company, though most of them seem unwelcome. He’s good at whatever he sets out to do, be it shushing a quarrel between two other officers or tearing out the throats of whoever seeks to Challenge him.  Riddick supposes that watching the man isn’t all that hard on his eyes either.

**49\. Resist**

Riddick has never been one to resist the urges that seem to whirl around his head, pushing and fighting for first position; they’ve gotten his out of plenty of situations, kept him alive, though not always safe. He’s tried to quiet them before, shut them up so he could have a little peace and quiet, but the results are never good. It’s one of these urges that insists he follow the oversized invader that killed Imam back to wherever the fuck he came from. It’s one of these urges that insists he kills the other man, take a life for a life, and if another voice in his head springs forward as soon as the other is quiet, telling him to look at this new fighter, broad, and strong, and beautiful, and another voice demands that he claim what is his, his, his, well, he’s never been good at shutting them out. 

**50\. Passive**

Vaako has never been a passive creature. Quiet? Always, but never passive. He has a fire in him that Riddick has hardly ever see in anyone else, and he handles that fire with precision, deciding who gets singed, or burned, or devoured. Sometimes, when exhaustion sets in, or the man is injured, the fire simmers down to embers, but never goes out. He doesn’t want to see it go out. 

**Author's Note:**

> Leave a comment if you liked it.


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